Posts Tagged: "famous inventors"

The legal determination about whether an invention is obvious seems completely subjective and sometimes even arbitrary. In some technology areas nothing ever seems to be obvious, in other areas virtually everything seems to be obvious. This requires a patent attorney or patent agent to have familiarity with how patent examiners interpret the law of obviousness in a particular innovative area. You might suspect that this would mean that for low-tech gadgets it is more difficult to describe an invention that is non-obvious; while in high tech areas it would be easier to describe an invention as non-obvious. That frequently isn’t the case though, which leads to even greater frustration for inventors.

In the past decade, the patent system has been turned on its head. Inventors are now villainized as cartoon characters called patent trolls simply because they assert their hard-earned patent rights against corporations who steal their inventions. These infringing corporations have cleverly cultivated the myth that all patent owners are patent trolls by engaging high-powered lobbyists and public relations firms to loudly attack inventors. This toxic concoction of myth, media and money has gagged opposing voices effectively creating political cover for the government to make rapid and fundamental changes to patent law that skew the field toward big corporations at the expense of inventors and small innovation companies, including those high tech start-ups that are responsible for creating high paying jobs.

So you have an idea and want to file a patent application? There are a number of things that you need to know about the invention and patent process that can help you focus your efforts and know what obstacles lay in front of you. I have gone through the IPWatchdog.com archives and created several “reading assignments,” which will hopefully be more manageable, and which will help get you started.

Calling all inventors! Lifetime Brands, the largest non electrics housewares company in the United States, is hosting an Innovation Day on Monday, October 5, 2015, at their corporate headquarters in Garden City, NY. This event will give housewares inventors the opportunity to pitch their products for the purpose of landing a licensing deal with this industry leader.

Pitfalls to be on the lookout for when you are preparing the Background of the Invention. First and foremost it is critical to remember that your patent application is about your invention, not the prior art. You will only discuss in vague, cursory terms the prior art and only to the extent that it can be useful and not harmful. You must always remember the problems inventors face when they lock themselves into a particular articulation of structural features and when they trivialize their own invention by making it seem obvious.

It is absolutely critical to understand that this complete and full description MUST be present as of the filing date of your application. If you file an application that does not describe the invention to the required level required by U.S. patent laws the application is defective and it cannot be fixed. The only way to fix an inadequate disclosure is to file a new application with an adequate disclosure, but that means you obtain no benefit from the filing of the earlier inadequate patent application.

When to get a patent search done is largely a matter of choice, but one that also depends upon the purpose of the search. Most frequently, inventors will seek a patent search once they have an invention that they think is worth patenting, but sometimes inventors won’t yet have an invention that is complete, but would like to get a sense of the patent landscape to determine whether it even makes sense to continue the project and whether there may be some available space that they could target. These are two different purposes for a patent search, so the first step is to determine why it is that you want a patent search.

Design patents are, in my opinion, an unfortunately overlooked patent. While a single design patent is a weak form of protection, they can be obtained quickly, rather inexpensively, and you can market the product using the terms “patented design” once a design patent has been obtained. Therefore, inventors and their representatives would do well to consider whether one or more design patents would be useful to supplement protection sought by a utility patent in order to facilitate a larger business strategy.

Generally speaking the first step toward commercializing an invention and making money is typically to pursue the patent path. For those new to the industry it is important to understand that on the road to a patent there are many mistakes that inventors can make unwittingly, some of which will ultimately make it impossible to obtain a patent. With that in mind, here is a list of the top 5 mistakes inventors make, followed by discussion of what you should do to move your project forward in an appropriate and responsible way.

Inventors and entrepreneurs who are looking to cut costs frequently want to do their own patent search. This is a wise first move, but inventors need to be careful. It is quite common for inventors to do a patent search and find nothing even when there are things that could and would be found by a professional searcher. So while it makes sense to do your own search first, be careful relying on your own search to justify spending the thousands of dollars you will need to spend to ultimately obtain a patent. In other words, nothing in this article should be interpreted as me suggesting that inventors can or should forgo a professional patent search. There is simply no comparison between a patent search done by an inventor and a patent search done by a professional searcher. Having said that, every inventor should spend time searching and looking if for no other reason than to familiarize themselves with the prior art. Of course, if you can find something that is too close on your own you save time and money and you can move on to whatever invention/project is next.

Today, our patent system is faltering. For the first time in our history, inventors and their counsel are considered villains for defending hard-earned patent rights. Companies that steal patents from inventors are called our innovators. The innovation world has turned up-side-down. A few misguided decisions by the courts and the “so-called” America Invents Act of 2011 has made it a CEO’s fiduciary responsibility to steal patented inventions and massively commercialize them with no concern for patent rights.

It is understandable that those who are entering into a business endeavor would want to know what their potential exposure might be, and when you have an invention perhaps the single largest potential liability looming is the threat of infringing a patent owned by another. This being the case, it is understandable that individuals and small businesses would like to be able to obtain a patent search and opinion that if they were to do what they are about to do they would not be sued for patent infringement. The analysis required in order to make this determination is daunting, takes a lot of time and comes with substantial liability for the patent attorney who offers the opinion. What this adds up to is a freedom to operate opinion costing a lot of money. Allow me to explain why.

Last week I wrote about adopting a patent strategy in order to lay the foundation for success. What the article did not touch upon, however, is how you can use procedural mechanisms available at the Patent Office to expand your patent into a patent portfolio, or how to correct unforeseen problems with your patent (or portfolio) that may needlessly compromise…

Patents provide a competitive advantage, and those sophisticated in business know enough to look for and exploit whatever competitive advantage exists. Patents are the 800 pound gorilla of competitive advantage, but realize if you are going to want and need significant sums of money from investors rarely does a single invention or patent command attention. No one wants to invest significant funds into a company that has a one-and-done approach to innovation. That is why the most valuable inventions will have applicability in a variety of fields, and will have a variety of different implementations, alternatives and variations.

When setting out on a new endeavor it is not wise to pursue a path to the end and then ask whether what you did was correct. You should seek help along the way to make sure you are doing what is required. Otherwise you are likely to get to a point where the most economical solution is simply to start over.